Exporting

1. 1.Click the download button in the transport bar0:00
2. 2.MP4: frame rate, range, resolution and quality0:01
3. 3.GIF: palette, dither and loop0:04
4. 4.Lottie: vector JSON or a .lottie file0:05

Description

A logo reveal in Animate. The download button in the transport bar opens Export animation. MP4 shows frame rate, range, resolution and quality with a summary of the size; GIF switches to palette, dither and loop settings; Lottie lists what the file can carry. The frame rate is set to 120 fps for MP4.

How to

Export a video for social

1. Click the download button at the right of the transport bar (or in a composition's header, or More → Export → Export animation… in the top bar).
2. Leave Format on MP4. Pick the Frame rate (the timeline's own, or 24 to 120 fps), the Range (the work area, if there is one, or the full timeline), a Resolution (1080p for most networks) and the Quality.
3. Check the summary line: size, frame count, length, and about how big the file will be.
4. Click Export MP4, and pick where to save it.

Export a looping GIF

Pick GIF. Keep Palette on Shared (no flicker), Dither on None for flat colour or Ordered for gradients, and Loop on Forever. A GIF defaults to 30 fps at most and can't go past 50.

Hand an animation to a developer as Lottie

Pick Lottie, then Lottie JSON or dotLottie. If something in the frame can't be carried (a shader, a blur, 3D, video), the Lottie option is disabled and the dialog names each layer and why. Otherwise the list under the summary says what will be baked frame by frame, drawn as an image or left out.

Reference

The export button on the transport bar (or in the composition's header) opens Export animation. It renders frame by frame through the same sampler the timeline plays with, and streams the result to a file, so long, large exports do not fill memory. The file downloads (or, where the browser allows, goes straight to a file you pick).

For one still frame, park the playhead and export the frame from its Export settings (or Copy as PNG): a still export from Animate is the frame posed at the playhead, the same pose this export draws for that moment.

The summary line shows the size, frame count, duration and an estimate of the file size. The dialog remembers your format, Lottie file type, resolution, quality, bitrate, palette, dither and loop on this device. A progress bar with Cancel export replaces the button while it runs.

Sound needs every audio clip to be playable: a clip this browser cannot decode stops the export with the clip's name rather than exporting a silent video. If the mix is too loud in places, the result says how many samples clipped — lower a clip's gain.

Lottie

Lottie writes the animation as vector shapes and keyframes that a Lottie player (lottie-web, the iOS and Android players, dotLottie) plays at any size. Choose Lottie JSON for a .json file or dotLottie for a .lottie zip (the dotLottie 2.0 layout). Resolution and scale do not apply, because the file is the frame's own size.

What carries over:

• Rectangles, ellipses, stars, polygons and vector paths, with solid and linear or radial gradient fills and strokes (weight, caps, joins, dashes). A frame's inside stroke is kept inside its box.
• Text, as glyph outlines. It looks the same in every player and needs no fonts.
• Groups and frames, as precomps. A frame that clips does so with a mask, and a mask layer becomes a track matte.
• Images, embedded in the file.
• Trim paths, as Lottie trim paths: the outline is written once and only the trim's start, end and offset are keyed.
• Shape morphs, as Lottie path keys at your keys' own times and easing, so the file morphs the way the canvas does.
• Position (motion paths included), scale, rotation, anchor and opacity, plus fill colour, stroke weight, corner radius and trim. Keys keep their timing: linear, bezier and hold curves, and quad and cubic eases, stay keyframes.
• The timeline's markers, as Lottie markers named by their labels, each lasting until the next marker.
• The frame's state machine, in a dotLottie, when Include state machine is on.

What gets baked: springs, back, elastic, expo and other curves Lottie cannot ease with become a key on every frame. Behaviours such as wiggle, spin and loop, text animators, counters and scene transitions are baked the same way. Each frame is sampled with the same sampler the other formats render, so the file plays what the timeline plays. A shadow, a GPU-only paint (angular or diamond gradient, pattern) or a sticky becomes a still image that keeps its motion. A composition's sound is left out.

When something cannot go to Lottie at all, the Lottie option is disabled and the dialog names each layer and why. That covers shader fills, layer, background and progressive blur, glass, halftone, noise and texture, 3D layers, video and the dissolve blend mode. When Lottie is available, the list under the summary says what will be baked, drawn as an image or left out.

The agent can export Lottie too (export_lottie), with the same frame rate, range, file and state machine options.

To start from something drawn for Lottie, the Lottie templates are sector packs of icons, loaders, states and hero loops. Each one exports with nothing baked and nothing drawn as an image.

Importing Lottie

Open a Lottie .json or .lottie file with Import into this file or Import as new file. You can also drop it on the file browser. It comes in as a frame the size of the animation, with a timeline at the file's frame rate and length, so it plays in Animate straight away.

• Layers and shapes. Layers become frames. Shapes become rectangles, ellipses, stars, polygons and vectors, with their fills, gradients and strokes.
• Keyframes. Keys become keyframes: bezier easing stays a bezier curve, a hold stays a hold, and a curved motion path stays a motion path.
• Precomps. A precomp becomes a clipping frame that plays on its layer's clock.
• Parenting. A layer's parent chain is kept.
• Masks, mattes and images. A layer mask or a track matte becomes a mask. Images go into the file's media.
• Path animation. An animated path, or an animated mask, becomes a vector whose outline is keyed: it morphs from key to key.
• Markers and state machines. Lottie markers become timeline markers. A dotLottie's first state machine becomes the frame's state machine.
• Trim paths. Trim paths become the stroke's trim, with their keys. Trim paths that run through several shapes one after another trim each shape on its own, and the import says so.

Lottie features with no counterpart are listed when the import finishes, and are not dropped without a mention. These are expressions, layer effects, repeaters, merge paths, time remapping, inverted mattes and 3D layers. Text layers become editable text in your fonts.